‘The Adventures of Pete & Pete’ Celebrates 20 Years and I Feel Old

If you’re in your mid to late 20s like me, then you remember spending your childhood days with Pete & Pete. Those ginger haired, same named, brothers went on some crazy adventures with Artie: The Strongest Man in the World, Ellen – Big Pete’s girl friend (not girlfriend) and, of course, Petunia. Petunia, the inappropriate but awesome buxom woman tattoo inked on Little Pete’s forearm.

The Adventures of Pete & Pete was one of those classic Nickelodeon shows that shaped my youth. It was just so ’90s! I remember watching episodes over and over again, even though I had seen them a million times because I just couldn’t get enough. I still think about Pete & Pete whenever I see a vanity plate, a garage door opener or creamed corn in the supermarket. I can even still remember most of the words to the theme song by Polaris (my best friend actually stumbled across it over the summer and we shared some fond memories). It’s weird how vividly I remember some of those episodes even though I haven’t seen them in who knows how long.

Who doesn’t remember the episode when Little Pete decided to answer the phone that was ringing for 27 years, or the lawn competition between Dad and his neighbor causing Little Pete to tunnel underground to get out of the house? Or, when Big Pete had to work at the country club and act as its mascot, or when he finally gets up the courage to ask Ellen out on a date? Or when Ellen freaked out about being the perfect dot over the ‘I’ in the marching band (I played the French Horn, too), or when she asked that eternal, maddening question in math class: why does X = Y?

What is even more mindboggling is the fact that The Adventures of Pete & Pete just celebrated its 20th Anniversary. I know, CRAZY! I am definitely not old enough for one of my favorite childhood shows to be celebrating a 20th Anniversary, but I guess that’s life.

The great thing about the 20th Anniversary which took place at San Francisco’s Sketchfest, is that some of the cast members who took part also decided to film a little video for Funny or Die, which is amazing. I love this video for many reasons, but the main reason is that the cast is awesome enough to poke fun at themselves, 20 years later. The two Petes may not have gone on to have illustrious careers, but they are still good enough sports to joke around about it.

Looking up who else was on the show led to me to a long list of guest stars who did go on to have successful careers, or were big stars back then. Iggy Pop and Debbie Harry popped up as a neighbors, LL Cool J was Little Pete’s teacher, Selma Blair, Michelle Trachtenberg, Janeane Garafolo, Bebe Neuwirth, Chris Elliott, J.K. Simmons, Steve Buscemi…the list goes on and on.

I love Pete & Pete. It holds a special place in my heart tied to so many memories from my youth. It also makes me wistful for good youth oriented programming that I feel is missing in today’s world. Why isn’t Nickelodeon still producing shows like this? RememberSNICK? The kids today have no idea what they are missing out on.